4 ‘chosen’ beauties end up in winners’ circle

WINNERS ALL. “Our” bets clinch major titles—and then some. RICHARD A. REYES

Last Sunday, March 30’s Binibining Pilipinas finals took all of three hours to glamorously, languorously unfold, but in our view, its outcome was pretty much a foregone conclusion. Here’s why: During the tilt’s first hour, we jotted down the numbers of the few contestants who made a particularly strong impression on us—4, 25, 27 and 35—and kept an eye out for them throughout the show, hoping that they would continue to do well in the swimsuit and evening gown showcases.

Happily, they did exactly that, so we continued to place our bet on them to do particularly well in the competition—hopefully, up to the announcement of winners.

Why only these four? Well, No. 4. Parul Shah, was really unique and exotic, very comfortable in her own, dusky skin. No. 25, Mary Jane Lastimosa, was the complete package, confident without being cocksure, the polished epitome of a beauty queen, from top to toe. No. 27, Hannah Ruth Sison was cute as a button, and No. 35, Yvethe Marie Santiago, represented Asian beauty at its best.

This is not to say that the other 36 semifinalists were not worthy of our consideration, they just didn’t “hit” us in the “complete” way that our spontaneously chosen bets (we didn’t know them from Eve) happened to.

The first indication that we were on to a good thing came when the 40 official candidates were finally trimmed down to 15. —What do you know?, all of our four bets made it! Hey, were we being prescient, or what?

Then came the “dreaded” Q & A portion, with the 15 lovely survivors having to spontaneously answer “heavy” questions posed by the members of the board of judges. Would our four favored choices survive that daunting gauntlet? Well, their answers weren’t brilliantly memorable, but they passed muster. Whew.

No surprise

Unfortunately, a couple of the other finalists were “hit” by questions that were too ponderously “heavy,” like being asked to share thoughts on “Filipino heroism”—! It was no surprise that those poor contestants “dried up”—the “fault” wasn’t entirely theirs.

We hope that lessons are learned from this unfairly hapless experience, and that next year’s jurors will make it a point not to burden the tilt’s contestants with the well nigh impossible task of being exceptionally beautiful and brilliant at the same time.

Back to “our” four bets: After they survived the “deadly” Q & A portion, it was all over but for the final choice of the tilt’s top winners. Would they make that final cut? —What do you know?, they did: No. 27 was second runner-up, No. 4 was Miss Tourism, No. 35 was Miss Supranational—and No. 25 was Miss Universe! (Completing the list of top placers were No. 11 as first runner-up, No. 13 as Miss Intercontinental, and No. 22 as Miss International.)

How did we pull off that four-for-four feat? We didn’t do it, they did. We just happened to place our bets on (some of) the really most promising bets. Still, you can’t blame us for dancing a little celebratory jig, can you?